Lin wows capacity crowds at the LSE

Professor Justin Yifu Lin, former Chief Economist at the World Bank, and author of ‘Against the Consensus’ (published next week by the Press) enthralled a packed house at the London School of Economics on Monday evening with a thought-provoking look at the causes of the global financial crisis.

Lin, who is Professor and Honorary Dean of the National School of Development at Peking University and who was Chief Economist and Senior Vice President of the World Bank between 2008 and 2012 (the first economist from the developing world to hold this position) spoke for an hour to a sell-out audience of academics, journalists, students and members of the public about why the crisis was so serious and so widespread and why current theories about it provide inadequate solutions. He also outlined new proposals for achieving global stability such as creating a global Marshall Plan and a supranational global reserve currency, before taking thirty minutes of questions from the floor and signing copies of the book.

Professor Lin has been in the media spotlight this week with articles in the Financial Times, Economist and Wall Street Journal and interviews on CNBC Europe and BBC Radio 4’s The World Tonight. ‘Against the Consensus: Reflections on the Great Recession’ is his first book since stepping down at the World Bank and is published by the Press on July 1.